Well, at least she isn't sick

Today was one of those days where once Amelia was in bed, all we could do was shower off the beating the day gave us and flop down on the couch. Don't get me wrong, I love that crazy little girl, but good Lord can she be a handful. She had multiple visits to Time Out, several fits where she threw herself on the floor, and more than one brush with death. Okay, so maybe she didn't have any brushes with death, but if tomorrow goes like today...she will.

Royal Wedding

All this madness for the Royal Wedding has me thinking only one thing.... what am I going to do one day when a filthy rich prince catches a glimpse of how beautiful Amelia is and wants to marry her? With how awesome she is, I think this is pretty inevitable. I guess I'll watch tomorrow to see how I'm supposed to act.

Prayers

Tonight, I'm just worried about friends, loved ones, and frankly, my immediate household as these storms tear through the South. I already know of one friend whose family lost their house tonight. So, if you have any spare prayers out there, please use them all.

Move

As we sat in traffic this evening on our way to dinner...

Me: Mookie, All these cars are in our way!

Amelia: Move, cars! I hit everybody!!!

So, yeeeahhh, apparently Amelia suffers from road rage.

Hmmmmm

At some point tonight when I was standing in my tub wearing my swimming trunks helping Amelia shower, it occurred to me that maybe this whole "Amelia in the big tub" thing isn't the best idea ever. I don't think I correctly accounted for nights where Meggan was unavailable and I had to help.

Big Tub

Amelia took her first shower(with the help of her mom) the other night. For this monumental event, we decided to let her do it in our oversized shower. You have never seen a kid have a better time getting clean. Now, "I take bath in big tub" has overtaken "I eat waffles" as her favorite pastime.

Yes, my 2 year-old is rocking a shower cap...

Amelia and Olivia

My nephew brought his wife and 1 year-old daughter to my house for Easter weekend. It was pretty fun to watch how Amelia interacted with a baby. At times, she was sweet. At other times, she was not so sweet. The first 5 or so pictures will show you all you need to know about how sharing went...

Security Briefing

This is a briefing from the Head of Security. We have received intelligence regarding a one year-old that will be infiltrating our compound tonight. Here is a picture of the subject...





Despite her sweet, sleepy appearance, I assure you she is live wire. The subject is to be considered a threat to hug and is extremely lickable.

Keep up the good fight,

Sophie
Chief Security Officer

P.S. - If approaching subject from the rear, I suggest you use all possible caution as she is not yet housebroken.

Simple Pleasures

If there is a kid alive who doesn't like playing in couch cushion "forts", I have yet to meet them...

Easter Egg Hunt

Today was Amelia's big Easter egg hunt at school. As I mentioned on here, we've been practicing hunting eggs so we would be able to really bring the pain. Weeeeellll, there was one factor I suppose I missed when setting up practice - emotions. In my head, Amelia needed to use her eagle vision to find the eggs, and her freakish strength and speed to gather them. Unfortunately, I didn't account for the fact that once all hell broke loose and grass and eggs were flying everywhere, Amelia would start bawling at the sight of ANY other child picking up ANY eggs. She apparently thought it was going to be just like the back yard where she walks around while everyone watches and celebrates each egg she finds. Oh well, lesson learned.

P.s. - I'd like to give a shout out to the parent who thought hard Jolly Ranchers were good treats for 2 year-olds. Next time, just opt for chicken wings, they are safer.

Great Night

I have too much to do for my class tonight to make too long of a post, but I wanted to stop by here and say that I am having a great night. There are two main reasons:


1) After Amelia got in her pajamas, she gave me a hug and said "Daddy, I love you"

2) We are on our 5th day or so of no coughing. This means sleeping through the night, no inhalers, and no steroids. Of course, now that I have mentioned it...she'll be sick before morning.

My little star

A mighty wind

We decided to go on Easter Egg Hunt training yesterday. Why would we train our daughter on how to hunt Easter eggs? Well, because she has an Easter egg hunt at school Thursday and we don't accept failure in this family. Okay, technically that is part of the reason I did it. However, I'm pretty sure Meggan and Amelia did it because there aren't many better ways to spend a Saturday afternoon.

In order to really ramp up the challenge, we decided to do it during an immense wind storm...



Two World Champion egg hunters...

House Guest

I surprised Meggan today by skipping out on work and doing some projects around the house. One of those projects was to attempt to get our flower bed out of its current state of death and despair. I'm not sure how successful I was, but I know at least one creature liked it...

Guilty?

Does this sweet little face...


look like the face of the person who would color on our newly painted walls...


Maybe not, but this smile makes me think she just might know something about the crime...

Oh what a night

As expected, Amelia and I had a blast spending time together tonight. Trust me, it's not that we don't love having Meggan around. It's just that we find excellent ways to spend our time while waiting for her to come home. Tonight, we played as hard as we could, we baked cookies and delivered a few to the neighbors, and we went outside for a little finger painting...

Setting up her art studio...


Putting in maximum concentration...


Taking a break to consider her next piece...

Tomorrow

While I understand tomorrow is never promised, I am going to go out on a limb and guess tomorrow is going to be much better than today... or yesterday. There is one simple reason for this- Tonight, I got home from work at midnight. Tomorrow, Amelia and I are having a daddy-daughter night. On the scale of awesomeness, it's really no contest.

Forget what I said

Yeeeahhh, so you can forget all that crap I said about Spring in the Carolinas...this evening, our house started getting pounded by hail.

Here's a pretty good size chunk from the deck (next to a quarter for perspective)...


It didn't fall alone...

Ahhh, Spring

There are few things more pleasant than springtime in the Carolinas. The first few months Meggan and I moved here, we ran no heat and no air conditioner. It was a striking difference from the swampy heat of Florida we left behind. Now that Amelia is getting to an age where playing outside is fun for all of us, Spring has the chance to be even better. However, it's becoming obvious that chance hinges upon a very big IF...as in IF Amelia can be around pollen without ending up in the hospital. If not, maybe that swamp wasn't so bad after all.

Not so fast

For the last two years, I have thought I was a pretty good parent. However, this last bout of Amelia being sick has shown me that I simply had a very easy job raising a very easy baby. The severity of this coughing spell certainly hasn't been nearly in the league of others. That said, the facts that it has come from nowhere and the doctors have essentially given up on figuring out the cause have really done a number on me.

In the past, the period of time after Amelia went to bed was a chance for relaxation and rest. Now, I think I can safely say Meggan and I dread putting her to bed. It is only a matter of time before the coughing starts and the stress builds. We try honey. We try a humidifier. We try steroids. We try Vick's. We try onions. We try elevated pillows. We try inhalers. We try D-Allergy. We try Singulair. We try cough medicine. We try prayer. And on most nights, we try all of the above...and none of it matters.

I'm certainly not any better or worse of a parent than I was before Amelia started getting sick. I just have to work a hell of a lot harder for it these days. I used to think rocking her to sleep and making her feel safe was enough. Last night, she rolled off her elevated pillow and literally used my head as a replacement...for over an hour. As I contemplated moving her hot, pacifier slurping coconut off my cheek, I realized I was just happy she was sleeping and I couldn't disturb her. I'm not sure if that makes me a pretty good parent or just a really tired parent. Either way, I'd like to go back in time and tell my pre-sickness self to take it easy on the self congratulation because any monkey can parent a happy, smart, healthy child.

So little time

After much internal debate, I have now enrolled in the Writers' Program through UCLA Extension. While I am very excited about the program, I am a bit concerned about the "time in the day" problem. I now have a fairly demanding job, a chronically sick child, this blog, the Writers' Program, and an additional charitable project that is in its infancy. So, I'm not sure how I am going to squeeze all that into my waking hours. I do, however, have my priorities in line - Father, Husband, Son, everything else. I think I'll be fine as long as I keep that perspective in mind. Besides, with Amelia keeping us up all night coughing, I get an extra 6 hours to accomplish things...who needs sleep?

Top Chef

It doesn't feel like work if you are enjoying it...


Cooking is fun...making a mess is hilarious...


The product of a strong effort...


Now, we wait..

Not a bad day

It might not have been a record setting Sunday, but for Amelia, it was a day with much to be happy about...

A tasty jelly biscuit to start your day...


Playing with your ball in the yard...


A little watermelon to finish off the afternoon...

Rapunzel

When Amelia was born, everyone said "she has tons of hair, but don't worry, baby hair falls out"

Well, I'm still waiting...

A Big Night

We had a big night here tonight. I really don't know any way to describe it, so I'll just leave you with a quote from Amelia...

"I poo poo in potty"